The Chain
by Ooshka
Summary: Canon characters. Set three years after DEA. Eric is back in Louisiana, perhaps for the last time. Some ties can never really be severed, and Eric is intent on visiting what once was his. No E&S HEA.
1. If you don't love me now

**This has been buzzing around in my brain for a while, and I wanted to get it out before **_**After Dead**_** is released and we all get the low-down on what happens. Firstly, let me say the following:**

**This story does not provide a HEA for Eric and Sookie.**

**I wanted to explore a few other things, so I haven't gone down that road. This picks up three years after the end of _Dead Ever After_. It'll be in three parts, and I'll be posting them close together. This is my first ever foray into canon, so forgive me if anything appears too OOC.**

**The story, and the chapter names, are all inspired by the Fleetwood Mac song **_**The Chain**_**.**

**Disclaimer: I do not lay claim to these characters.**

_If you don't love me now, you will never love me again._

I'd been feeling restless all day.

Once, I'd thought that as well as being telepathic, I might have been a little psychic too. I now knew that not to be true, and I'd been more than thankful for it.

But, all the same, my nerves had been jangling since I'd got up that morning and heard the wind blowing through the woods and on towards my little farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. Sam had given me some odd looks as I'd been distracted by the world out the window and ignored the bacon that was burning in the pan, but he hadn't said anything to me.

We had a lot on our minds anyway. Work was a big part of that. Sam had gone in early to meet a delivery and I'd spent the morning stuck in the office going over rosters and menus and weighing up the price of liquid soap dispensers for the customer bathrooms.

I had never expected my work to be glamorous, but I found it wasn't occupying my thoughts as much as it once had.

Or maybe I'm remembering the day wrong. Perhaps my feeling of dissatisfaction came when Tara called in around lunchtime. She only stayed briefly, but it was long enough for her to list to me, once again, all the things she needed to get rid of now that Sara and Robert were past their babyhoods and no longer had use of baby blankets and cribs and baby swings and bottle warmers and diaper disposal systems. I could tell, even without pulling it straight from her head, that she was hoping I'd have some news for her, that I would lean in and whisper conspiratorially that she should put those things aside and I would find them a new owner.

But I couldn't say that. I had no news on that front. Sam and I had been married for just over a year now, and we'd entertained the possibility of a baby for longer than that, but no baby had yet arrived. It struck me as no small irony that the blessing bestowed by my fairy great-Grandfather, Niall, had rendered my land fertile in a way I did not appear to be.

Tara probably didn't have to be telepathic to realise that it wasn't something I wanted to discuss at length. She finished up her lunch and was on her way back to her store.

I looked around Merlotte's Bar and Grille and surveyed the other customers. Normally I found that a comfort, the continuity of the world I lived in, boiled down to the fact that the same faces appeared in the bar day after day.

Today, though, I found it a little constricting. Something was missing, and I wasn't sure what it was.

I retreated back to the office until it was time for me to leave. I was only working the day-time shift today; Sam would stay on to manage the evening shift. We didn't expect it to be busy, and I was tired anyway, and glad to turn into my driveway and open the door to home.

The wind still howled through the trees and the darkness was gathering behind them; the days were shorter at this time of year.

I tried very hard not to have an opinion about that, or think about it for too long. Not these days. The sun set and the world moved on.

I spent the evening drifting around my house. It was hard to not to think of it as my house, still, even though I had shared it with Sam for more than two years now. Our house, I corrected. Ours.

It made me feel a little less adrift to think about Sam's presence. I wished that he was here with me, that I could make us dinner and we could sit together and talk about our days. But the reality of the business we owned was that nights like that were rare, although possibly savoured all the more because of that fact.

Instead I turned to the television to distract me, but it did a poor job. I switched it off and decided to head on to bed.

But in the hallway, I stopped. There was something…out there.

Once upon a time I might have dismissed that feeling as my mind playing tricks on me, or my imagination spooked by watching the murder-mystery show I'd just switched off. But I knew better, now.

I supposed other people might imagine themselves safe in their own homes. They might think that if you lock the door and check the windows everything will be OK.

I had been shot in my own front yard. Nearly burned to death in my bed. I had been beaten by a pack of Weres who lay in wait in my living room. I'd dodged an attempted kidnapping in my driveway but only after I'd already been kidnapped by vicious fairies as I reached my own backdoor.

I had seen my…friend…take a bullet for me in my kitchen, before I shot the perpetrator myself and watched her bleed to death on my kitchen floor.

I was not someone who could be comforted by a few locks and pieces of wood. Luckily, I didn't have to be. I had wards. I had magic woven into the space outside my property which stopped those who meant me harm from crossing.

So the fact that I could sense the tell-tale void of a vampire's brain outside, in the woods, close to the house, close enough that they must have passed through the magic barrier my friend Amelia had placed there for my protection meant they must be friend, not foe.

But even with that knowledge, I was worried. I knew it wasn't Karin; she no longer patrolled my woods nightly. And I knew it wasn't Bill, he was away in Europe working on his database. This was an unknown vamp, and that thought filled me with dread.

I stopped in place. I waited. I listened to the wind and I held my breath, hoping the void I could sense wouldn't get any closer.

Individual vampires are harder to pick out than humans. I sense their absence, rather than their presence, and a black hole is a black hole, whatever way you look at it.

But there was something familiar about this particular black hole. Something that made my heart constrict a little and kept me rooted to the spot, staring at the wallpaper and the mirror with the gilt frame that had collected more dust than I'd noticed for a while.

I wasn't sure what to do. I hoped that he would give up, go away, and just leave me in peace again. But the void stayed put and I realised I couldn't do that any longer and I would have to step outside the door and confront the past.

As I walked down the porch steps I caught a glimpse of the white figure in the trees. "You can come on outta there!" I called. "I know you're there."

"I wouldn't expect anything less," Eric said as he stepped out from behind a tree so smoothly it looked a little like he was gliding.

And then we just stood there, watching each other. Eric hadn't changed at all since I'd last seen him; I doubted he could say the same about me. I tried very hard not to care about that, but I couldn't completely shrug it off.

I was over 30 now. I was never going to be that same young girl who'd welcomed her first vampire into her life again.

And then I realised that Eric's expression wasn't something I was used to seeing on the faces of the vampires I came into contact with, at least, not the vampires I knew. He looked at me warily, as though he wasn't sure if I was the welcome committee or the advance guard.

I was used to having a reputation that often preceded me. As a child, growing up telepathic, I'd been Crazy Sookie. As an adult, when I entered the supe world, the gossip about what I was capable of was occasionally useful. There were still members of the Long Tooth pack of Weres who believed I held the power of life and death in my fingertips.

But this, from Eric, felt a little odd. It was a sign, I guessed, of how far we'd come from what we were.

"You weren't sure what kind of a reception you were gonna get," I stated, and Eric nodded, once, in agreement.

I couldn't remember the last time we'd agreed on anything quite so easily.

"I left my anger behind a long time ago, Eric." That may have been somewhat of a lie, but I decided I just wasn't going to feel guilty about lying to Eric. "Just like you left here. And you're not supposed to be here now. So, what's up?"

"I am…passing through," Eric said, his expression not giving much away. Now he knew that he wasn't going to be met by burning torches and pitchforks he had relaxed imperceptibly, but he hardly looked friendly. No vampire ever really does, they don't do small-talk or chit-chat or any of the other things that keep interactions between humans pleasant even when they're entertaining thoughts that are less than pleasant about each other. Vampires don't care what you think about them, they don't make first impressions and they don't consider humans worth their effort most of the time.

And, after more than a thousand years as a vampire, I'd have to say Eric had it down pat.

"Well, you can't pass through here. You're not supposed to be in Louisiana anyway, are you? Not since that deal you did with Felipe and Freyda. So get outta here before you bring down a world of trouble on both of our heads." I turned on my heel and started to walk back to the house.

"You think I'd bring you trouble?" Eric said, from right behind me. It's hard to escape a vampire if they don't want you to go. I could, of course, have made a break for it and run for the house. I had no intention of re-instating Eric's invitation to my home, so he couldn't get inside. Once I shut that door he was stuck on the other side of it and I wouldn't have to listen to his explanations any longer.

But I had to admit I was a little curious about why he was here. Curiosity had been my downfall more than once, but old habits die hard.

"I know it," I said, turning around once more. "Past experience, remember?"

"I think you're over-simplifying things." Eric folded his arms and looked down at me. The watery moonlight shone through the golden mane of his hair making his face look incredibly pale.

"I think I don't care to have a conversation with you about the way I choose to state things, Eric."

Eric looked away from me, over his shoulder, almost as though he was worried someone might be there. There was no one, of course, but Eric's actions worried me, and I re-considered my decision not to bolt for the house.

"So, you gonna tell me why you're here or are we done?" I asked, in a tone that was harsh and impatient, even to my own ears.

"To see you." Eric made it sound like that was the most natural thing in the world. Like we hadn't parted on bad terms over three years earlier when he'd gone off to marry the vampire Queen of Oklahoma and broken my heart in the process.

"Well, I hoped you cleared it with Felipe. I sure as shit don't want to have to hose your ashes off my roses."

Eric's mouth curved upward, a smile playing on his lips. "That wasn't meant to be funny," I said. "Nor is it an idle threat. You got through the wards because you mean me no harm, and that's the only reason I'm standing out here. But if they come for you, not me, they'll get through too. And I ain't getting involved. I have too much to lose."

"Now," Eric added for me.

"I always had a lot to lose, Eric. You just didn't always care what I was risking as long as I was doing it to save your neck."

Eric stood up straighter. "I see your opinion of me hasn't changed while I've been gone."

"You did a shitty thing to me, and you did a shitty thing to Sam, and then you skipped outta town to your new life in Oklahoma. What the hell's changed, Eric?"

"Everything. Nothing."

"The second part is right. You're still the same bullshitter you always were. Look, either spill or go and annoy someone else. I bet Pam'll be glad to see you."

The mention of Pam's name caused a small flicker of expression to cross Eric's face. "You can't go and see Pam?"

"I had better not…appear at Fangtasia, no."

I thought about that. If Eric couldn't go to the club then he was definitely here covertly. "You're on some kind of mission?"

"I have been to Mississippi to parlay with Russell Edgington about a casino venture he wanted some backing for."

"Which means getting a free pass through Felipe's territory?"

"Correct."

I waited to see if Eric might fill in some of the blanks, but vampires were all about blanks. He just stood there, which was preferable, I guessed, to making any kind of move towards me.

But maybe not as good as leaving.

"You better go, Eric."

"I'd rather not."

"Why? What good is it to stand around in my backyard? Go and…go and do whatever it is your wife sent you to do."

Eric's handsome face became darker at the mention of Freyda and his relationship to her. "Would you rather that I am not here when your husband gets home, Sookie?" he said, with the hint of a snarl.

"Of course I would. But not because I have anything to hide…unlike you from the sound of it. But because you know what you did to Sam, and to us, and I would think the shame of the way you behaved would make you nasty. Nastier than you are now, anyway." I might have forgiven Eric a lot of things in the time we'd been apart but the way he treated Sam and had tried to stop us having any kind of a relationship, that still rankled.

"I see your opinion of me hasn't improved with my absence. I guess I should have expected that," Eric said, with some distaste.

"Why? You think Sam'd be running you down? Eric, honestly, I doubt you ever cross his mind." That was maybe not the whole truth. I didn't see shifter's minds as clearly as I did other folks, and I didn't go prying into all of Sam's thoughts, not if I could help it, anyway. But every so often I got a flash from him. And there'd been a few about Eric.

None of them I'd want to repeat.

Eric narrowed his eyes and I thought again about running for the house. But then his arms fell to his sides and he let out a long, unnecessary sigh. "This used to be more straightforward," he said. "We used to understand each other."

"Right. Yeah. When we had the blood bond." That seemed like a long time ago. It was a long time ago. Although for a while after it was broken, even after Eric had left for Oklahoma, I still had a feeling of anticipation as the sun set and I prepared for the addition of Eric's moods and feelings to my own.

But I hadn't felt that in a long while now.

"Look, I know you didn't force that on me," I continued. "And I know it was just one more piece of vampire shit in a whole heap of vampire shit that rained down on me during that time, but I agree with one thing. It did make it a whole lot easier. For you."

"You think I tricked you into loving me?" Eric's words weren't as harsh as some of his previous accusations had been. They perhaps bordered on curiosity, as though this was news to him.

That saddened me. It seemed like just more proof that he'd often forgotten that there are two sides to everything, including a blood bond.

"I think it made it easier for you to…I don't know. You once said we were too closely bound together for your liking. I think you were right. I don't think love is meant to be like that, where you know what the other person feels all the time."

"And that's from the telepath," Eric said, dryly.

"I know what I am." He'd made me a little angry now, refusing to acknowledge the imperfect beginnings of our love affair. "And I deal with it as best I can, same as you. I didn't say I was perfect or that I had a perfect way of doing everything, but at least I damn well try Eric. I try to be the best person I can be."

"For Sam."

"For me. I try to be the person I want to be. Not someone else's dream woman." I paused. "Did you think I did that…for you?" Now I was the one who was curious. I'd always known that I held a certain allure for vampires, and it wasn't just my face or my figure that attracted them. I had a little fairy blood, the essential spark and a disability that could become a gift in the right hands. At least, a lot of them thought so. I was vampire catnip under the right circumstances.

But had Eric just thought I played that up to land me a big, bad, vampire sheriff?

"No. I believed you were genuine," Eric said, as though we were discussing the weather. "A little naïve at first…and, certainly you were unlike anyone I had met in a long time, perhaps ever. But I did believe you were genuine. When you took me in after I had lost my memories you did it because you wanted to help me."

"But you didn't realise that until after you got your memories back?" There'd been a time, after the witch's curse had affected Eric, when he'd been suspicious of what had occurred while he was under it.

"You saved me at Rhodes, too," he added. "At some risk to yourself."

"At great risk to myself. I don't survive impacts as well as you-all do. But it was complicated back then. We were…connected." There was silence for a moment. I guessed Eric was lost in his memories too. I had got Eric and Pam out of the bombed building in Rhodes, but we'd also been bonded by then. Who could tell if it was the pull of that connection which sent me to their room that day?

It was a string we'd never unravel now.

"You broke our bond," Eric said, a little accusingly. "You broke it without telling me and we were never the same."

"You want to throw around accusations, Eric, you better be careful. You broke my _heart_. You broke my trust. It wasn't just the blood that connected us, it was…it was…all that other stuff I felt for you, the faith I had in you. The faith we had in each other and the fact it would all work out. It all got broken and all that was left were two people who couldn't be together anymore."

"You agreed we should part," Eric spat back. "You were more than clear about that."

"Because you married someone else. After, I might add, _you_ divorced _me_."

"You did not even want my love anymore. I tried to tell you I could still offer you that; it was still mine to give freely even if my allegiance was owed to another. Nothing had changed." Eric was starting to sound a little on the petulant side and it was getting on my nerves.

"Eric, everything had changed. And I'd seen that your love comes with a big bunch of lies you tell yourself, and me, to make it all seem OK. I couldn't deal with that anymore."

We stared each other down in the chill night air of the backyard, both waiting for the other to make a move.

"I didn't think it would be this difficult," Eric said, suddenly.

"What? Trying to make me see reason? Or, at least, your version of it."

"Being near you again. You're still…" Eric leaned right over me and took a big old sniff, right by my head. It was a little disconcerting to say the least. "Intoxicating," he finished, as he straightened up.

"But I'm not yours," I reminded him, lest he get any funny ideas. Or any ideas that weren't very funny at all.

"No. But you were, once."

There wasn't much of a question in Eric's voice, but I answered him anyway. "I was."

"Do you regret that, Sookie?" It wasn't what I expected Eric to ask me, he didn't seem to be someone who was big on regrets, I didn't think he'd have survived so long if he was. A thousand years is a long time to live, and a long time carry your regrets around. Eventually you'd just buckle under their weight.

"That we were together? No, I don't." I had given it some thought in the last year or so. With the benefit of distance, I thought I had a better view of our relationship. Maybe my judgement was still a little clouded when it came to Eric, maybe it always would be, and maybe I'd always struggle to reconcile some of his later actions with the vampire I loved so deeply, but I thought I had as good a handle as I ever would on what had happened between us.

I just didn't necessarily want to explain that to the vampire himself.

"Not even…the way things ended?" Eric asked me.

"Oh, I regret plenty about that. And if that's your idea of an apology, Eric, you suck at it."

Eric narrowed his eyes. "I think if any apologies are forthcoming, then it should be on both sides, Sookie."

"Really? What would you like me to apologise for? Breaking the blood bond that was forced on me and gave you free access to my emotions, or not wanting to die just so I could be your mistress on the side? Take your pick Eric, but it'll be a cold night in hell before I apologise for any of that."

"You're still angry at me."

"I have a right to be. Over some of the things that happened, I have a right to be angry. You treated me poorly, and you know it, otherwise you wouldn't be trying to duck out of it now."

"I did not come here to duck out of anything, Sookie." Eric sounded a little exasperated now. "I came here to…"

"Yeah? Why are you here? I didn't think vampires did closure." I looked at Eric's face. It was deathly still in the glare of the light from the porch.

"You've come to say a final goodbye?" I asked, and my voice was little more than a whisper.

"I am…I am going somewhere else after this…"

"Secret vampire business?" I asked, even though it seemed a little childish to try to lighten the mood.

"Yes." Eric looked at me for what felt like a long time, almost as though he was trying to memorise me.

"OK," I said in the end. "So, you're on a dangerous, and secret, mission and you thought you'd stop in and…what, exactly? See if I was disposed to bestow a favour on a soldier who might not make it back from his war?"

"I just wanted…" Eric looked away. "To spend a moment with you."

He sure did make that sound romantic and wistful, but I was an expert of looking at the flipside of what he told me. "And a moment is all you have?"

"You know that things move quickly in our world. I must be ready."

I nodded. Eric had always had pressures and nothing had been simple when we'd been together. Witches, bombs, a takeover by another monarch, a fairy war, we'd weathered them all but it hadn't been enough to keep us together forever.

"I wish you would say something," Eric ventured.

"What would you like me to say? Good luck? Try not to meet the true death? Let me kneel down and kiss your feet before you go?" I hadn't expected that last remark to slip out and it took me a little by surprise. I was flustered, still, by Eric's appearance and by the feelings it dredged up.

Things I'd thought I'd let go of, were now bubbling to the surface.

Eric decided to meet fire with fire. "Is that all you have for me now? Your anger? Anger that I had no choice and I did what I could to make sure that you were still free, that you could have all of this…" he swept his arm around, pointing out to my land and my house, "…and your husband too. Tell me Sookie, has your perfect life not lived up to your expectations?"

"I never said it was perfect. I never said Sam was perfect. But he gives me what you never could, Eric. I know you'll find this one hard to believe, as long as you've lived and all, but he has what you don't. Time."

Eric stood very still when I said that, and I wondered if that was what flabbergasted looked like on a vampire. Sure they got to live forever, in theory, but being dead during the day, during _every_ day, was a little constricting to say the least. Add to that the pressure of the vampire world; pressure by makers, by those higher up the chain of command, the pressure to just get on, to be the best vampire you could be, to keep existing just that little bit longer it all mounted up and it ate into the night time hours.

The time Eric and I had spent together had always felt fleeting, snatched as it was from the other demands on him. At the time I had a made a decision that I would take what I could.

Now, I had other priorities and even if Eric's maker had not contracted him to marry the Queen of Oklahoma something else would have eventually forced us apart. I was human, and my time was limited.

"I could have given you eternity, Sookie," Eric said quietly.

"But you would have had to kill me first." I sighed, and felt a little like we'd had this conversation before. "I don't want to be a vampire."

"Because you…" Eric searched for a word. "…dislike what we are."

"Because I don't want to be out of time, Eric. This is my time. This is the place I belong, and not just because my family have lived here for generations, not just because my fairy kin blessed the land, but because this is my place in the world. These people I see every day, they're my people. For better, or for worse, and trust me, if anyone knows the worst side of humanity it's most likely me, this is where I want to be."

Eric didn't say anything to that, so I continued on. "I don't hate vampires, Eric. I never did. But you have to see that you are out of place, you are out of your time, your life was cut short and you became something else. Something rooted in magic and power, not in the everyday. That's not what I want."

"But if, as you say, I was pulled out of my life then I was set on a path to something bigger. Something to which I am connected as deeply as you are to your so-called people. You call it magic and power, and, yes, it is both of those things. But there's more, and I wish I had been able to show you."

I shrugged. "I guess I got to see too much of the bad side early on. I wasn't exactly given the full sales pitch." Even before my relationship with Eric my entanglements with vampires, and my relationship with my vampire neighbour Bill Compton, had led me into a dark and dangerous world. "I just want to live out my life and try to live it well. To make it matter, not just to me, but to the people I connect with."

"This is about your God," Eric said, a little scathingly. I knew better than to try to argue religion with someone who'd been around at the time of the Vikings. We were never going to see eye to eye on that one.

"This is about me figuring out what I want in my life. I thought I wanted to be special, I thought I wanted to find a place where I belonged, with other people who didn't fit in. But that isn't me, the price is too high." Sam had once warned me about that, and I'd chosen to stay on the path I'd set. I couldn't, or, rather, wouldn't regret that now, not when I reflected on where that path had led me. But I didn't want to retrace my steps, either.

"What I want is what I have, Eric. I want to be a part of the lives of my friends and neighbours, someone they call on in a crisis, someone they care about, someone they even take for granted occasionally. Just plain old Sookie Stackhouse, of Bon Temps, Louisiana."

Eric's expression suggested he didn't think much of that. "You think my life is that terrible, Eric? My circumstances so constrained? Take a look at your own existence. How long is that leash Freyda has you on? She's risking your neck and you're just going along with it, because in your world, that's the way the game is played."

I stepped back a little, afraid of what that comment might provoke in Eric. But he remained as still as a statue. So still, in fact, that I was tempted to pick up a stick and poke him to make sure he hadn't actually turned to stone.

When he finally spoke, it wasn't the reaction I'd expected. "You've changed," Eric said. It sounded more than a little like an accusation, as though I'd done something contemptible just to spite him.

"Human, remember? I get to do that."

"Mostly human," Eric reminded me.

"But I get to choose. And I choose human."

"Because I couldn't choose you." Eric kept trying to push that party-line, and it made me a little angry to hear it again. "And for that you still won't forgive me. In fact, I believe you enjoy hating me."

"You could have chosen me, Eric. You know you could have. You didn't have a great choice, I know that. I knew that, then. But you had a choice, as much as anyone does. And you chose what you thought was right for you. As much as I hate the way we parted, hate the things we said and did, I don't hate you anymore. I won't pity you, but I don't hate you."

Eric looked past me to the house. "You always preferred me without my memories," he said. "When things were not so complicated."

"I was fond of that man. But he wasn't the man I loved."

Eric turned back to me. "Past tense, Sookie. Your love for me has gone?"

"I still feel something for you. Not love, not anymore. But something near it." As I'd let go of the love, I'd been able to let go of the anger I felt towards Eric. Most of it, anyway.

"I'm grateful," I added. "You and I, our moment has passed. But in that moment, when Neave and Lochlan had shredded me body and soul, then you were the man I needed. The one who gave me his strength and his love, the one who helped me put myself back together. Without you, I doubt I would have been standing here, able to make the choices I have. I am grateful for that Eric. I always will be. But I don't think there's any shame in the fact that our time is over."

"I miss you," Eric said. "I miss being connected to the living world." There was a long pause. "I didn't think I would."

"Choices, Eric. We all make them, and we all live with them. Some of us just have to live with them longer than others."

I was tired, and I didn't feel like walking down memory lane anymore with Eric. "Goodbye, Eric. I wish you well on your…venture." I turned and started up the porch steps.

"Will you mourn me?" Eric called out.

"If you meet the true death?" I faced him again. He closed the gap between us, so fast he was just a blur.

"Yes." Eric didn't seem to be that fazed by the prospect of his demise. I wondered if this was another tactic on his part.

I thought about it. I felt like I had mourned him a long time before, but I realised I had mourned the death of our relationship. I tried to think of a world which didn't include Eric Northman, and it made me a little sad.

"I will," I told him. "I will mourn you."

"Then that is something. That is something we still have. I will live on in your memory, if not in your blood."

"And if you ask me, I think that's better than a blood bond." As I said that, Eric's mouth curved upwards in a smile.

He leaned over and kissed me on the cheek, his lips cool and smooth. "Goodbye, Sookie. I hope your future is bright." He took a few paces backwards, and then he was gone, straight up into the sky.

I took one last gulp of the night air, and I walked back inside my house, shutting the door carefully behind me.

I looked at the clock in the kitchen; Sam would be arriving home soon.

As tired as I was, I wanted to stay up to greet him, and tell him about my strange visitor in the night. The thought of Sam standing in the kitchen, running his hand through his red-blond hair and saying "Well, shit Sookie," made me feel more content than I had in a while. Eric had gone, and my life would go on as it had done. And there was a strange comfort in that fact.

My life wasn't perfect, but there were things I could count on. And Sam was one of them.

I was extremely grateful for that.

I felt like the nervous energy I'd had earlier in the day had all dissipated now. I was no longer casting about, looking for what might be out there. I felt settled, I felt content, and I felt at peace.

I hadn't expected that to be the result of Eric's visit, but maybe getting those things off my chest had done me the world of good.

I poured a large glass of sweet tea and sat down at the kitchen table. And then I glanced over at the calendar, the one pinned to the wall with a large picture of the bar at the top. I realised that it wasn't anything to do with Eric at all. I finally figured out what it was I'd been waiting for all day, what I'd been trying to ignore, pushing to the back of my mind.

I looked at the date. There was every chance I was pregnant.

**Thanks for reading!**


	2. Run in the shadows

**Thank you for all your responses to the first chapter of this story, I've really enjoyed the fact that it's been so well received.**

**Disclaimer: I do not lay claim to these characters.**

_Run in the shadows._

Pam had been expecting Eric's arrival since she'd received his text message. Of course the message was not explicit enough to mention a time or a place for their meeting. It had merely read _I miss the Louisiana weather at this time of year_.

But Pam knew enough to read between the lines and find the true meaning. She just hoped that none of Freyda's spies, the ones who no doubt read all of Eric's messages knew the same. She hoped that they were bored, or sloppy, or perhaps had been swayed by her maker's charms.

And Eric had a lot of charm. When he cared to use it.

So she wasn't surprised to arrive at her house, in the hours just before dawn, to be greeted by the sight of Eric Northman stepping out of the shadows as she approached the door.

She nodded, to acknowledge his presence, and unlocked the door before turning to punch numbers into the keypad in the entryway and deactivate the alarm. Eric followed her inside, and shut the door behind him.

It was just like old times, but then, it was always like old times for Eric and Pam. The maker-child relationship made sure of that. They were never really apart, after all. They were bound by blood and magic, just as they had been since the night Pam had risen as a vampire for the first time.

"You are here," Pam stated, when they were both seated in the living room. Though vampires didn't make small-talk there were still some rules to the conversation, especially between maker and child. Pam would never outright demand information even though, as the sheriff of this area, she might rightly expect any other vampire to provide her with it. And Eric was a vampire who was no longer welcome in this state. Her monarch, Felipe de Castro, had decreed that. Should another vampire, with a similar ruling, have appeared in her presence, then she would have been free to deal with them as she saw fit, as Felipe's agent in this little corner of Louisiana.

With Eric things were different, however, and she had to tread carefully. She had no intention of punishing him, or handing him to Felipe. And she had to extract whatever information Eric was willing to share cautiously. Press him too hard and she would not enjoy the consequences of her actions.

"Passing through."

"May I ask to where?" Pam was already calculating the possibilities but, if she was charged with throwing Felipe off Eric's scent, she thought it only fair that she have some concept of what was going on.

Of course, in the world they lived in, that was a rare luxury. Their world was full of shadows, whispers and half-truths. The same vampire who'd entertain you one night, would have you staked in your coffin the next day. No one was safe, not really. Their existence, as long as it was, was precarious.

"You may. Texas."

Pam considered that. Texas had been in turmoil since the bombing at Rhodes. Stan's long recovery time, and eventual demise, had left Joseph Velasquez embroiled in a constant battle to hold onto his territory.

"At Freyda's behest?"

"Of course. I have been to Mississippi firstly, to waste time with Russell."

"For which Felipe granted you leave through his territory."

Eric smiled, just a little. "It was granted to our party."

"He does not know you are here." Pam did not need to ask, but stating it plainly made it also plain that Eric was taking a big risk. Eric might serve the Queen of Oklahoma but Felipe De Castro, spread as he was over three states, was Pam's monarch, and she owed him her fealty. Felipe would not be pleased should he find Pam was harbouring Eric, whether he was part of an officially recognised delegation or not. Eric's presence here was a big risk for Pam.

But then, she could not remember a time when she was not in the business of taking risks for Eric.

"It is best that I maintain a low profile, so I need to find shelter with a friend," Eric said, but, of course, it was only the best course of action for one of the vampires in the room. And the description of Pam and Eric as friends was tenuous at best. He might pretend they were equals, especially since Pam's elevation to the sheriff position he once held, but they were far from that.

"And then on to Texas?" Pam prompted. She was curious about what Freyda had planned.

"Yes. There have been some rumours from vampires who have moved north, into Oklahoma. Things are not well under Joseph."

"I have heard the same," Pam replied. "He is distracted and there is a great deal of restlessness. But we have known that for a while. Why does Freyda choose now to act?"

Eric sat still and silent for a moment, a not unnatural state for a vampire. Pam assumed he was considering how much information to give her. After all, information was power and even though he trusted her, their world was not one built on easy exchanges between friends. Anything powerful, and therefore desirable, was fought for.

"It is not only the humans who come over the Texas border with Mexico," Eric said in the end. "And there has been a great problem there. The state is large, and Joseph, and his strongest vampires, are currently in El Paso dealing with an all-out war."

"Leaving the north of the state, and the border with Oklahoma, to its own devices." Pam could see quite clearly now where Freyda's desire lay. "Do you think they will be open to your offer?"

Had he been human, Eric may have shrugged. Instead he merely looked away from Pam. "I do not entirely know. Our spies believe that there are many vampires willing to cleave to a strong monarch, but there will always be resistance."

"And too much resistance will be bad." Pam restrained herself from adding 'for you.' She was not bound to Freyda in the same way Eric was and, therefore, wasn't as invested in her plans for expansion. Her maker's continued existence, however, was another matter. For better, or for worse, Pam's impulse was to protect Eric from the true death at all costs.

It was complicated, being a vampire.

"The people I have with me are good fighters. Freyda has sent her best," Eric said.

"Of course she has. She has sent you." Pam looked at Eric who made no show of modesty, but simply inclined his head in agreement.

Pam wondered if this plan was wise. Risking her people was one thing, but risking her consort, her second, the vampire she'd fought tooth and nail to bring to Oklahoma, that seemed a bold move on Freyda's part and Pam wasn't completely sure that a strip of land in Texas would be worth it.

There had to be more to it, but she wasn't sure what. And she wasn't sure she would get the answer from Eric, either. It was a lesson she'd learned early on as a vampire. Eric may have fallen on the side of the better kind of maker to have, but he was still a vampire. A very old vampire who didn't take kindly to his word being anything less than law or his motives being questioned.

She'd tried, not so much what you would term interfering, in his life, but certainly taking an interest in it, when he had been involved with Sookie Stackhouse. It had not had a happy ending. At least it hadn't for Eric and Sookie. Pam thought there was still some hope for her.

And after all this time alive, she was clinging to her hopes as best she could.

"And of course this has not been before the council," she said.

Eric's face didn't give anything away, but then that was nothing new. Pam thought she could read him as well as anyone could, but even her attempts were hit and miss at times.

"Texas is a large state and difficult to hold. Stan managed it, barely; Joseph is struggling. It would not be a ridiculous idea for the state to be divided, as others have been." Eric sounded as though this was not the first time he'd made this argument.

"Division is one thing. Annexation to another state is different matter and one less common." Pam hoped that Eric wasn't going into this blindly, assuming that his will was enough to carry it through. The reality of the vampire world was that there was always someone else you had to run it past, someone higher up the chain, someone to whom you owed fealty and allegiance. Eric's actions in Texas could well shatter some of those allegiances and Pam wasn't sure whether Freyda had a full understanding of that, as she'd spent the last few decades embroiled in a bitter struggle to come out on top in her own state.

She had prevailed, but it didn't mean she always would.

"I think Felipe has set some precedents about divided rule," Eric murmured. "He has been quite…forward-thinking in the actions he has taken."

Pam thought that there were many ways she could read Eric's statement on Felipe, and she decided that she didn't care to delve too deeply into them right then.

"But if Felipe finds out what Freyda has planned, it will be bad," she said.

"For all of us," Eric added unnecessarily. Pam wished he hadn't. She was more than aware of the fine line she walked as Eric's child and Felipe's sheriff, the competing allegiances she owed and the possibility that her desire to protect Eric would run counter to her own sense of self-preservation.

None of these were new feelings, of course, and there was no easy answer, no way to break the bonds that pulled her in different directions. Pam had simply become used to them.

"Your visit will be brief then." Pam tried to make that sound like a question, but it wasn't. As a sheriff she felt she commanded a little respect in her own home, even where her maker was concerned. Surely Eric could understand her reasons.

"Of course," Eric said smoothly. "I merely to ask to stay today. Tomorrow night we move on."

Pam considered that. "Then you have already been to see her. I thought that was a familiar scent."

Eric smiled. "How much time have you been spending with Sookie that you can recognise her scent?"

It was Pam's turn to smile now. "Not Sookie; her woods. I recognise it from when Karin was stationed there."

"Ah." Eric did not ask after his eldest child, and Pam volunteered no further information. They would know, of course, if any fate had befallen her. She was merely travelling, as far as Pam was aware. Making the most of having no task to perform for Eric in more than a century.

There were nights that Pam was almost tempted to join her.

"Seeing Sookie, it was…not the meeting I had hoped for," Eric said, which struck Pam as oddly human. Volunteering information about personal matters was not part of a vampire's normal repertoire. She thought, not for the first time, that Sookie's effect on Eric was nothing if not profound. She'd always been able to bring out the man from the vampire.

Pam allowed herself a brief moment of regret for the way things had been, and then she moved on to more important matters.

"You may use the travel coffin in the guest bedroom. I think it will be large enough to accommodate you reasonably comfortably." Even amongst vampires who were turned in the modern age, Eric's size was still imposing. Although Pam had been a vampire long enough to know that size wasn't everything. While Eric could appear terrifying, and while he was a great fighter, it didn't prevent other vampires believing they could best him. Some had come close. And, one day, it might happen.

After all, Sophie-Anne's prized fighter Sigebert had been brought down in the Merlotte's parking lot by Sookie, and her vehicle. Sure, Eric had delivered the final death but it had been Sookie's actions which freed him to do so.

Pam didn't think Eric would always be that lucky.

Eric inclined his head, but didn't thank her. Her hospitality was a mere formality anyway, expected as it was of vampire children. He gave her a new life, she gave him a coffin now and again. On some nights she didn't think it was a bad exchange.

Other nights she wondered what it was like to be free of such duties. She supposed no one really was. Everyone in the world had some kind of bond, whether of duty, or of care, to another creature.

Freedom, such as it stood, was a myth the humans clung to desperately. She assumed it made them feel better about their short life-spans.

As Eric stood up from the couch he had occupied, Pam examined the feeling that was gnawing away on the edges of her consciousness. Unused as she was to probing her emotions it took her a few moments to pinpoint exactly what it was she was experiencing.

It was fear.

"I wish I could be by your side, when you fight," she said, suddenly. Eric stopped in his tracks and looked at her for a long time.

"That would please me. You are…you were always an exceptional second."

Had Pam been human, her face would have flushed with pride. She desired her maker's praise in the same way any child might. She wanted him to think her bold and fierce, and to make him proud of his creation. Nothing was worse than a maker who regretted their choice.

"I am what you have made me."

"Perhaps so. But you are also more than what I saw in you, when I made you. I chose you, and I chose well. I have valued our time together."

Eric didn't ask for Pam's feeling on the matter of their time together, and she didn't volunteer them. He had chosen her, and his choice had been the only one that mattered that night. She did not regret her turning, but she would not examine what other choices there had been for her, either. It would not do any good now.

"And we will be together again, no doubt," Pam said. Eric was contracted to Oklahoma for two hundred years, but once that time was over, assuming he survived Freyda's machinations, then he would be free to strike out on his own again. Pam would heed his call, should it come, the same as she had in the past. Time did not make a difference to vampire relationships; Eric and Karin had been apart for hundreds of years before he called her to Shreveport.

Vampires were constant, and their bonds never broke.

"No doubt," Eric agreed. And then he thought for a moment. "But, should anything happen…should I meet the true death, then I charge you with upholding our bloodline. Your blood is my blood and it must continue on, in you, in Karin, and in the children you make. Mourn me, but do not let my blood die out."

Eric's eyes bore into Pam's and she nodded in understanding. There was nothing greater she could do to honour her maker than to carry on his line. "We will be a chain," she said. "And we will go on, unbroken."

Pam weighed up whether to voice her concerns and decided that it was now or never. Or, rather, she decided she would gladly suffer the consequences of voicing them, if and when they came.

"I dislike that you are so tightly bound to someone who is so ambitious, and ruthless. So willing to risk you in the process of getting what she wants." Pam waited for Eric's reaction to that statement.

He seemed to consider it for a moment before answering. "I am sorry you feel that way. For me, it is a great opportunity."

Pam was a little annoyed as she had hoped for something more candid from her maker. While not expecting great confidences from him, she hoped that the two of them being alone, away from prying eyes and ears, would allow Eric to confess his true feelings. Whatever they may be.

"You are content with your position, then?" she asked, genuinely curious. As a vampire who had always seemed to enjoy the small amount of freedom he had as Sheriff of Area 5, to be the consort of a queen, any queen, was not something Pam would have expected Eric to appreciate.

"I am."

"And your wife is agreeable?"

"My queen is beautiful, fierce and charming."

"You description of her could well be a description of yourself," Pam commented. Eric didn't reply. "I assume, then, that she has earned your loyalty and your love?"

"Not love…no. Not that. But I admire her, somewhat." Eric was quiet for a moment. "And she has been more accommodating than I had expected."

"Still, I suspect there have been…adjustments, to make."

"There have. But there always are. Nothing stays the same for long. I have hope…no, I have confidence that what I am doing now will benefit me greatly in the future. This mission to Texas, the one you are counselling me to be wary of, there is great risk attached. Of that I am aware. But also, should it be in my favour, great reward. I have an opportunity I would not otherwise have had, and I am not foolish enough to pass it up for I do not know when I will have the same again."

Pam considered Eric's answer and the information it contained. She had begun to suspect that perhaps Freyda might not be the driving force behind the grab for Texas. Two hundred years was still a long time, even to a vampire as old as Eric. He was right in that nothing stayed the same; the trick was to make sure that you were stable even as the sands shifted beneath you.

Eric was more than aware of that though, so she didn't outline her thoughts to him. He seemed to be passed the talking mood now, anyway, and had started to walk towards the guest room, in preparation for the day's death.

As he reached the door of the room, he turned back to Pam. "When you rise tomorrow night, I shall be gone."

Pam felt both relieved and dismayed at that thought. Eric's presence was a comfort, but also a danger.

"I shall await your next message," Pam replied.

"Yes. I do so enjoy our discussions of the weather, and of gardening." Eric smiled.

"As do I, but maybe we should broaden our topics? I fear that Freyda's spies will get suspicious."

Eric waved that thought away with a hand, and Pam pursed her lips in annoyance. She wished he would be more careful, but he was unnerved by new technology and not particularly interested in investing time in thinking up new ways to communicate. Given the choice, he would prefer to use spies and entrust them with hand-written missives.

But vampires did not move about in the shadows as freely as they once did, and there were dangers now lurking for those caught crossing the borders without authorisation. It was not as easy as it was once to slip unnoticed through the night.

Pam feared that Eric's insistence on clinging to the old ways, to his old ways, would one day get him killed, much like it had his maker. It seemed to her that eventually every vampire reached the end of their ability to adapt and she hoped that this was not the start of Eric's decline. It had been a long time since she had met a vampire who had surpassed Eric in age, and she could understand why.

A vampire's time on this earth might be longer than a human's, but it was not necessarily endless all the same.

"I will handle Freyda, and her spies," Eric assured Pam, which was no assurance at all really. His handling of Freyda before their marriage had been less than effective, although his ability to play to competing interests had, perhaps, brought him more concessions from her than he would otherwise have had.

"And you will handle those…other matters?" Eric asked Pam.

"Sookie? Yes. I will continue to watch over her and keep her safe." Pam paused. "Because she is my friend," she added, to make it clear to Eric that it was not merely his edicts to protect his ex-wife which motivated her to take a keen interest in Sookie's welfare.

"That's good. I will hold you to the word you gave me when I left here. And when I ask for your help, I shall know you will fulfil your duty." There was something a little ominous in Eric's tone, at least, to Pam's ears there was. Maybe it was just that she was uncomfortable discussing Sookie with Eric after all this time, or maybe she hoped never to have to act on some of the requests he might make of her.

"Sookie is safe." Pam almost hoped that saying it enough times would make it true, even though she knew that was not the case. For any of them.

"Your monarch still agrees to leave her in peace?" Eric asked.

"Felipe shows no signs of changing his position. But, should he be provoked, who knows what he might do." Eric no doubt realised that his actions had consequences, not just for himself, but for all those linked to him. Pam was of his blood, and expected that her fate was tied to his. It had always been so. Sookie might not be so forgiving. Especially because she believed her life had been unwound from Eric's.

Vampires had long memories. And, though they might forgive, they never forgot. And Sookie had made quite an impression, good or bad, on most of the vampires she had met. It would be unthinkable for anyone to forget her completely, or the fact that she had once been Eric's.

"I hope that he will see the bigger picture. Felipe may be ruthless, but he is no fool. He will not start a war if he can help it."

"Perhaps not. But I, for one, would not like to see it come to that." Pam thought for a moment. "But I shall wait, and hope for good news from you. I wish you well, and may you have a swift run through the shadows to your destination. Send word when you have prevailed."

"I will." Eric looked at the wall and appeared deep in thought. "You will have word of our victory, of that, I am sure." Pam hoped he was, and that optimism would carry him through whatever he faced.

"By text please," Pam said, with a hint of playfulness in her voice. "I do not need to find a coffin for a half-savage Texan vamp, nor do I need to explain their presence in my area. Send me news of your garden."

Eric laughed. "I am fond of our roses, thorny as they are," he said, enigmatically, and then he stepped into the guest bedroom and shut the door.

Pam entered her own resting place, a re-purposed en-suite bathroom, and prepared herself to die for the day. Perhaps, she thought, this will be the last time I will rest in the presence of my maker.

She hoped not, but it never hurt to be prepared.

**Thanks for reading!**


	3. Never Break the Chain

**A/N Thank you all for your patience. I have been working like mad, trying to get this right. I'm thinking that there will be another short chapter to follow, and just round this off. Hopefully that will be along shortly.**

**Disclaimer: I do not lay claim to these characters.**

_Never break the chain._

Two nights had passed since Eric had visited Pam and she had yet to receive any further word from him. There was no point reading too much into that fact, though. There was every possibility that he was simply biding his time, or making contacts.

Or perhaps he had given up the enterprise and headed back to Oklahoma.

Either way, she had felt nothing through their bond which suggested he had met his final death, and so, as far as she was concerned, it was business as usual and she was in her office at Fangtasia going through the orders and staff rosters for the coming weeks.

And then the door to the office opened and Karin glided silently into the room. "Sister," she said, in her cool voice, as she took a seat in the chair opposite Pam without waiting to be invited.

"Karin," Pam returned. Karin's presence, while not completely unwelcome, was unexpected. It was not the first time she had returned, though, since being released from her service as Sookie's watch-dog. With time on her hands and no pressing engagements she seemed to enjoy spending time in Shreveport and with Pam.

Pam didn't quite have the same luxury of time as Karin did. And, occasionally, she found her company a little tiresome. She often wondered if this was what it was like for humans when they suddenly had to deal with in-laws. She had even gone as far as to ask Sookie how she had connected with her brother's wife when they'd spent time together.

Sookie had reported that she had found a combination of swapping recipes and sharing funny stories about Jason's childhood to be an ice-breaker. Recipes were something Pam felt quite unqualified to discuss and she doubted Eric's childhood contained any amusing anecdotes.

So she went back to spending time with Karin the old-fashioned way, mostly ignoring her until she made it plain what it was she required.

"I thought I would stop by, as I was passing," Karin said, although Pam had not asked her intentions.

"You are the second visitor who has passed through this week. I entertained our maker two nights ago."

Karin's countenance barely changed at all in response to that news, but Pam had hardly expected that she would adopt a jaw-dropping expression of surprise in the same way a human might, or that she would frown and express regret at having missed Eric, the implication being that Pam had somehow been the luckier of the two of them. Karin's vampire nature suppressed anything she might be feeling along those lines and her response was simply "Eric was here?"

"Yes. But it is not common knowledge and I confide only in you." Pam looked up from her computer screen and straight at Karin.

"Of course, sister. He is no longer welcome in this state." Karin didn't seem to have an opinion on that either, and, for some reason, that made Pam a little frustrated. It wasn't as though she'd had a relationship of equals with Eric, and it wasn't as though he was particularly forthcoming with his feelings, but, in many ways, he was a preferable companion to Karin and her utter blankness.

Pam was hardly a new vampire and she had met many over the years who were both more and less human than Karin but it still did not stop Pam wondering just how Karin had arrived at the persona she adopted now.

Was this what Eric had made her?

"No. I believe he was not welcome at Sookie's either," Pam said, dryly.

Karin didn't comment, and Pam continued working. After a while, much longer than a pause in a normal conversation would have been, Karin said suddenly "He was not welcome because she would not have expected him."

Pam looked up at Karin, and realised she was still talking about Sookie. "You think Eric should have called ahead?"

Karin frowned, slightly. "Sookie does not like being surprised. I learned that when I first met her. She needs to be more prepared so she is not surprised so often." Karin nodded as though she was the expert on the matter of Sookie Stackhouse and her likes and dislikes. Pam thought that spending all that time in the woods near Sookie's house, dodging conversations with Bill Compton and being eyed warily by Sam Merlotte didn't really make Karin that much of an expert on Sookie.

"I'm not sure the surprise was at the heart of Eric's problems," Pam murmured. She looked back at the screen.

"You think he did wrong?" Karin asked. When Pam looked at her again, her pale blue eyes were wide, and she looked far more human than she usually managed. Karin seemed a little shocked at Pam's assessment of Eric's actions.

"Karin, I think…" Pam stopped. Karin might be of her blood, but she was still another vampire, able to twist any information Pam gave her and use it to her own ends. Karin gave the impression of being a little…slow, was not the right word. More out of step with the rest of the world. But Pam was not so sure that she was all that she appeared to be. Although, if it was a mask, it was not one that Karin had ever let slip. Not in front of Pam, anyway.

Pam had to consider how much she gave away. She had a position to protect, one that could very easily be undermined by her maker even if he were not angry with her.

"Yes?" Karin prompted.

"I think that it is not our business what our maker does, as long as we are there to support him as he does it."

Karin seemed satisfied with that answer. But she had clearly warmed to the subject of Eric. "I hear his time in Oklahoma is proving satisfactory. The queen will be very pleased with him."

"You have?" Pam asked cautiously, wondering if Karin had information she didn't, and hoping that if it was the case, then Karin would be tempted to share it.

"I passed through Iowa and spent time with one of Phoebe's vamps. She keeps a close eye on Freyda, and I believe there is…what is that expression?" Karin paused and looked helplessly at Pam, who was unable to help. Karin sometimes struggled with the modern vernacular, even more so than Eric did. It was hard to say whether it was due to a lack of application or interest on Karin's part, or simply the side effect of too many years spent in the shadows waiting to strike.

Eventually Karin said "Love lost. Or, rather, no love lost between the two. They are especially wary now Eric is there and fear his presence signals Freyda's desire to push north."

Pam thought about that information. Either Phoebe's spies were fools or they had tried to get Karin to spill the details on Freyda's tactics, presumably fed to her by Eric. Pam supposed that as the child of Freyda's consort both Karin and herself would always be a possible source of intelligence about the Queen of Oklahoma for every spy they crossed paths with, and a few curious bystanders as well.

Pam reflected that the next two hundred years were going to seem quite long.

"I think they are afraid of our father," Karin said, a little reverently. "As well they should be. He will bring death to those that cross him."

Pam refrained from rolling her eyes. Karin's devotion could be stomached when the object of it was present but she was not sure what its purpose was when he was elsewhere. She had at first suspected it of being a ruse to test her own loyalty to their maker, but now she was not so sure. It just seemed to be a part of Karin's makeup, perhaps a part that had been formed when she was human. It made her curious, in an idle way, about the circumstances of Karin's turning.

But she had never discussed it with her, in the same way she had never asked Eric for details of his eldest child in the entire time they'd been together. There were some lines that, even as a vampire, you did not cross.

"I hope you did not say as much to Phoebe's vamp. She will be sending someone to stake him during his daytime rest if she fears him too much," Pam said.

Karin frowned. "He will be safe."

Pam might have sighed, had she been a being who breathed. "He does not have a telepath, anymore."

"Telepath?" Karin's forehead creased, marring her otherwise smooth, blank features. "Oh. Yes. Sookie reads minds." She made it sound like that was as common as having brown eyes or five fingers. "But he is Eric the Northman, and his enemies should be wary."

It was on the tip of Pam's tongue to break the news to Karin that even Eric worried about his own untimely demise, but she didn't. For some reason as much as she found Karin's company sometimes tiresome, she was also growing a little fond of her.

Or perhaps that was just because they shared the same blood. That magical vampire blood could produce all sorts of unpredictable reactions and a certain…closeness…between vampire siblings would not be unheard of.

"I will get a True Blood. And bring one for you, too. You are working, and require sustenance," Karin announced, swiftly standing up and leaving the office.

Karin's desire to serve Pam was another facet of her personality that Pam found just the slightest bit odd. Like any family, there was a hierarchy in vampire groups and, despite her position as sheriff and the respect it commanded, it could not be denied that Pam was younger than Karin. By rights, Karin should have assumed Eric's position when it became available, and he should have been securing a solid future for his eldest child, much as his own maker did for him when he signed the marriage contract with Oklahoma.

But Karin seemed to occupy a position not just on the margins of society but on the fringes of their own bloodline as well. Pam had not met her until she was well over 150 years old herself. Eric felt no need for them to cross paths and Karin, although she had struck out on her own, seemed content to follow any orders Eric sent her way, even if they be to watch a farmhouse in the middle of the Louisiana woods.

It was clear she valued obedience above all else, but surely, even Karin got a little bored of serving someone else so completely? At least, Pam thought she must. Or maybe they were just different.

Sookie's great fear, one of them anyway, was that she would be turned by Eric and be just another vampire child, a matching companion to the two he already owned. That was what Pam had surmised when Eric and Sookie's relationship had imploded. She had vowed never to speak of it to Sookie, out of a friendship with a human which she understood less well than she did her relationship with Karin.

But, really, Pam thought to herself, it wouldn't be like that. Karin was quite different to herself and Sookie would have been different again. They would have been more than three blondes with the same maker, a mini-harem, if you like. Their purposes would diverge and they would be Eric's instruments in completely different ways.

Or maybe, Pam realised, it was the instrument part that Sookie disliked, more than the inability to stand out from the crowd. If that was the case, then it was hard to fault her logic. Sookie had been brought up in a world in which she enjoyed more choices than Pam could ever have dreamed of when she was human. She didn't believe that Sookie's choices had to end with when, or if, she should be turned.

Pam liked to think herself adaptable above all else. And now that vampires were living out in the open a large part of that adaptability was understanding humans and their beliefs. The freedom to make your own life, well, that was something they all wanted to believe in. On her more cynical nights Pam thought that far too many humans were prepared to go to war to protect something that no one actually ever achieved, but mostly, she could appreciate the humans' point of view, and intended to do very little to change it.

If she could help it, at least.

Karin returned with two bottles of True Blood, both warmed. She placed one down in front of Pam and then resumed her position in the chair opposite Pam's desk.

Pam wondered what it was that she intended to discuss this time.

"Do you miss Eric?" Karin asked, suddenly, which surprised Pam, all the more because Karin was not usually a vampire capable of surprising others. Not unless you attempted to deliver new furniture to Sookie's house late into the evening, that was.

"I endure the absence of our maker, as do you," Pam murmured. "And wait for the day I am called to him again."

"I don't think that's the same thing." Karin had now surprised Pam with two consecutive sentences. Pam reflected, again, that there was more beneath the surface of Karin that she usually let come out. Or perhaps it was just that she was comfortable with Pam now, and that Pam had taken the place of Eric, somewhat, anyway, in Karin's life.

"Sookie missed him terribly," Karin said. "When he first left. She wept many tears, although she would rail and beat her breast as well, when she cursed his name and the fact he had broken his promises to her." Pam thought that perhaps Karin was drifting into poetic license with her portrayal of Sookie as a spurned lover. "But then she…forgot him. And now she has another man who loves her greatly and who can be with her in the day."

"Yes," Pam agreed. "She is married to Sam."

Karin frowned, and looked as though there was a great internal struggle going on within her. "She did not love him, as we do," she said, in the end.

Pam took a sip of her blood and was tempted to just ignore Karin's last statement. She felt ill-equipped to deal with matters of the heart, Sookie's emotions or her ability to move on from her relationship with Eric. Love was for other people, for humans, for those who had the luxury of time to spend mooning over the way the hair fell into the eyes of the object of their affection.

Pam had little patience for such matters, and she had thought that Karin would be cut from the same cloth.

"It is different, for us. He is our maker." Pam thought that was a safe line to take.

"Yes," Karin agreed, slowly. "He has made us and we love him for that."

"We have his blood. Sookie does not."

"But she said she loved him," Karin insisted.

"And she did. But…" Pam made a waving motion with her hand, which struck her as a particularly useless gesture. But she was uncommonly lost for words and Karin did not appear as though she would be easily swayed from this line of questioning. "Eric released her. She is not his; she does not have a tie to him, as we do. She is not bound to honour and love him."

Karin seemed satisfied with that answer and picked up her bottle of blood. "Humans are fickle," she said, and then she took a long sip.

They sat in silence for a while. Pam continued working, and Karin finished her drink and then appeared to go into downtime. Pam had hoped that she might feel the desire to go and sit in the bar itself, they were short on vampires that night and Karin was always popular amongst the patrons, as she managed to look other-worldly and none too threatening at the same time. Of course people were easily fooled by vampire appearances, no less so now that they were out of the coffin than for the thousands of years previously when vampires had hunted humans in the night and tricked them into giving their blood, and other things, willingly.

Some things never change, Pam thought.

And then, Karin came to life again. "You think it is the blood," she said to Pam, and Pam immediately glanced at her now-empty bottle of True Blood, wondering if Karin considered it to be defective in some way.

"The blood?" she queried.

"Our blood. Our maker's blood. You do not think we love him. Not as Sookie did. You think it is only the blood that ties us to him." Karin's voice remained calm but there was no mistaking the accusation in her words.

Pam eyed Karin warily. They might be bound by virtue of the same maker, but their bonds were not in any way like the ties of a human family. If Karin decided to cause trouble, then Karin would be dealt with, swiftly.

And she would then have to deal with Eric. So it was better if it did not come to that. She tried to come up with a response that would serve to smooth things over.

"I think…" Pam stalled, searching for the best way to phrase it. "I think that in your heart, you know the answer."

"I am not sure I have a heart," Karin said, and she sounded a little sad.

Pam wasn't particularly enthusiastic about Karin's little-girl-lost act. "Karin, you are not auditioning for _The Wizard of Oz_." Karin looked at her blankly. It was not the first time she had been unaware of one of Pam's references to popular culture. "All I am saying is that if you think about what we are, you will know it to be true. What we feel for Eric is different. Not better, not worse…although it is, perhaps, more complicated. It is just different."

Pam was more than a little astonished that she had articulated those thoughts to Karin. Not just that she had been so candid with another vampire, but that she had admitted something she had been, not denying, but certainly not acknowledging for a while now. Since the time Eric met Sookie at any rate.

"What we feel…it is not love?" Karin asked, her eyes wide. Pam reflected, again, how topsy-turvy their relationship was. Surely, if anyone here was explaining how vampire relationships worked, it should be Karin herself.

"I think you need to answer that question, as it regards yourself, to your own satisfaction." Pam hoped that Karin would be occupied with that task for a while.

Karin, indeed, seemed deep in thought for quite some time. "No," she said in the end. "I don't think it is love…not like humans know it. It is…something though. I feel something for Eric." Karin looked down at her lap. "But it is not love." She sounded almost ashamed of that fact, as though she had failed their maker in some terrible and fundamental way.

Pam considered whether that was the case. Eric had always appeared to be fond of Pam, at times proud of her, frequently either amused or exasperated by her. They had, at the beginning of their time together, a great sexual relationship and he had unlocked desires in Pam that she would never had known existed if she had remained human. Eric had pushed her to become the best vampire she could be, but, of course, a strong vampire at his command was never going to go astray, was it? He had been loyal, and steadfast, but maybe none of that amounted to love.

And she doubted, very much, whether his actions towards Karin had been any kinder. She suspected, privately, that they may have been a little fiercer, if anything. Eric was younger when he made Karin, after all, and had been away from his own maker, the rather fearsome Appius Livius Ocella for less time than he had by Pam's turning.

Pam wasn't sure that Eric would be dismayed to realise that what Karin and herself felt for him was less than love, for she was not sure he'd ever had that to give to them in the first place. Blood, yes. Magic, definitely. Power, undoubtedly.

But love? That did not seem to seep through a vampire's bond.

"It is something near it," Pam said gently, a little wary of what might happen should Karin become too distressed. She had a fearsome reputation after all, even though it was possibly embellished for effect. Pam had a bar full of human patrons and a business to protect. "And I think that is good enough."

"You do not mind?" Karin asked.

"You do?" Pam countered.

"I…" Karin stopped, and her face became blank again. "I am uncertain as to how I feel about this, and that is what I find the most…disconcerting."

Pam nodded in agreement. Vampires preferred to deal in known quantities, sure things. The sun rose and you died, the sun set and you lived. Blood kept you alive, silver hurt you, and stakes through the heart killed you once and for all.

But humans had always been their weakness, and humans were nothing if not unpredictable. If vampires had a flaw, then it could be traced to their dependence on the human race.

None of this, of course, left any space for the contemplation of love. Perhaps this was a change reaped by the Great Revelation, Pam thought, the luxury of a guaranteed food source and the ability to turn our minds from hunting our prey to thinking about our emotions.

She wondered how long until the first vampire Shakespeare was discovered.

Pam straightened up. "I do not think we really need to concern ourselves with the matter of love. I know that I, for one, have more pressing matters that require my attention."

She hoped that Karin would take that as her cue to leave, but she remained seated. Pam suppressed her annoyance at Karin's inability to take a hint, and decided she should press on with her work.

She didn't get very far before she was interrupted again. "If we don't love him, if it is just the blood, then why do I feel so much better when he is near?" Karin asked.

"I cannot answer that. I am not in your position."

"But you feel it too." Karin's gaze was unwavering.

"Yes. But, I assume, that our bonds feel different. We are not the same vampire, after all."

"But Eric is. And that is who we are tied to."

There was a kind of logic to what Karin was saying, but Pam found she didn't really care to examine it at length. She wanted to be done with the conversation as quickly as possible.

With that in mind, she aimed her next sentence at what she thought the heart of the problem was. "That…may not be an issue for much longer. Eric has embarked on a mission of expansion for his queen. It is dangerous, and, when he was here, he warned me that he may meet the true death. I believe him."

"That does not seem a likely outcome," Karin retorted. Pam wondered how much was bravado and how much blind loyalty on Karin's part.

"I'm afraid that it does." If nothing else, thought Pam, this will give Karin something else to concern herself with.

"Even if we do not love him…not like a human might love him…I do not want him to be gone," Karin said.

"Nor do I. Don't misunderstand me, my fervent wish is that Eric continues on with his existence in Oklahoma and we all remain safe as a result, but I think we should prepare for the possibility that the opposite might happen."

"I do not know what my world will be like without him," Karin said, her voice quieter than it had been.

"Neither of us do. A vampire without their maker is a different creature, I believe. Well, you're friends with Bill. Perhaps he has told you his experience?"

"Friends?" Karin asked, puzzlement showing in her voice.

"Acquaintances, perhaps? He seemed to find your company entertaining when you were watching Sookie."

"He was…there…" Karin said, uncertainly. "But I did not ask him about his maker or his feelings on the subject. Mostly we discussed his work…and Sookie."

"I hope you were circumspect," Pam replied. "Sookie was Bill's before she was Eric's and that has always…made things a little more delicate."

"Sookie likes vampires," Karin said, although she didn't seem to have much of an opinion on the fact that Sookie had dated both Eric and Bill.

"Sometimes too much for her own good," Pam added.

Karin didn't reply to that remark, instead she said. "I should like a human of my own."

"You would?" Pam had not thought of Karin as someone who was particularly concerned with forging a connection with a human. She liked the donors she was provided with well enough, and she had, from time to time, left with a patron of the bar. But she had never seemed interested in anything more lasting, and did not hesitate to shun the company of others, even other vampires, for long stretches of time.

"Yes."

Pam found she was more curious about this than she would have thought. She'd never been one for long heart to heart chats, not even when she was human. But she was intrigued by this new revelation of Karin's all the same.

"What…kind of human?" Pam asked.

"Oh." Karin gave a small smile and looked pleased to have been asked. "I should like a boy. With dark hair and eyes. Who adores me, and is happy to sit in my presence when I require it and simply let me stroke his hair."

Karin sounded as though she'd been giving this a lot of thought. Pam wondered if this was how she had spent her time in Sookie's woods. Which was an odd thought as Karin seemed an unlikely candidate for spending time day-dreaming up her perfect man.

Although she hadn't actually said man.

"When you say 'boy', Karin, how old were you thinking?" Pam asked.

"Oh…14, 15 perhaps?" Karin looked over at Pam, who had raised her pale eyebrows. "16?"

Pam's lips pressed together in a straight line. "I think a little older would be preferable."

"18? But surely by then he will have other responsibilities, and a woman of his own."

"Karin, I think you have forgotten what century we live in. I know things used to be different, but moral standards have changed. More to the point, there are _laws_. And I really do not want the BVA breathing down my neck because your pet hasn't graduated high school yet."

"So…I cannot have a boy?"

"It's not up to me to say, except that if you do find one, it would be best if he was at least 21."

Karin's expression became one of distaste. "That's not a boy," she said. "That's…old."

"Be that as it may, Karin, you are not allowed to take a minor as a pet."

Karin's expression was disappointed. "I do not understand the modern world sometimes. People waste years of their lives for no good reason that I can see."

"Perhaps they have the luxury of being able to waste them, in a way that you and I did not." Pam often marvelled at the freedoms young people were given these days despite the fact that there were a myriad of ways that the society as a whole tried to keep them dependent for as long as possible.

"Perhaps," Karin conceded. "But I still think it is a mistake on the humans' part. And I am still…I still think I should be allowed a boy." Karin sounded a little bit petulant.

Pam thought about Karin's new desire for a human, or, if it wasn't new, it was a desire Pam had only just become aware of. She supposed that having a human was the first step to making a child. And Eric had been insistent about the idea of his bloodline being carried on. Although she did not like the idea of Eric meeting his final death, it didn't hurt to lay some groundwork.

Pam wasn't sure that she had time to deal with a new vampire herself; not just at the moment. And she wasn't sure that Felipe, who still liked to keep an eye on who was made in his territories, would countenance the idea of her bolstering her own numbers in that way.

But Karin seemed a little without purpose, so, perhaps it was time for Karin to become a maker.

"I'm sure you'll still be able to find someone who…adores you," Pam said, consolingly. "Even if they are a little older than you'd hoped."

"I am uncertain on that matter, Pam. To tell the truth, sometimes I think the humans are afraid of me." Karin looked away. "That's why I liked Sookie," she said, quietly.

"Well, we all like Sookie," Pam said, thinking as she heard the words that it was definitely an understatement. "But there's only one Sookie."

"And her brother is very old." Pam wasn't sure that that was the only thing that kept Jason from being Karin's companion, but she refrained from stating that.

"Maybe…" Pam said, slowly. "You should think about using a different name?"

"Karin is inappropriate?"

"Karin the Slaughterer sends a message that not many humans appreciate. They like to pretend that we are not capable of killing them…otherwise why would they flock to Fangtasia and stand within reach of Thalia? They like the illusion of danger, not an actual body count."

"But I have had that name for so long," Karin said. "I have used others, but this one…it feels more me."

Pam thought this was an odd thing for Karin to cling to, and suspected it had something to do with Eric. "Karin, I realise that you were with Eric for a long time, and, I'm sure, that you were a great asset to him, and that together you fought many battles. But those days are past and you do not need a name to strike fear into the hearts of your enemies. Even with a different name, those who need fear you will do so, and those who do not, will not judge you harshly."

Pam thought her speech was quite eloquent, but still to the point. Karin's expression said clearly, however, that she had not been swayed by the argument.

"It is my name, and has been my name since I was human."

"You…were human when you were named the Slaughterer?"

"Oh, yes." Karin looked at Pam. "That surprises you?"

Pam re-set her features back into the usual pleasant mask. "Perhaps it is just a difference in the time and place in which I was human. After all, I was bred to decorate a drawing room. There was not much room for slaughtering until I was turned."

"And no doubt you relished the freedom?" Karin inquired, as politely as she might ask whether Pam had enjoyed the festivities at the church picnic. Pam inclined her head to signify her assent.

"It was very freeing," Karin continued. "Becoming a vampire. I did not enjoy being human all that much."

"Hence, the slaughtering?" Pam asked.

"Yes." Karin was silent, and she cocked her head to one side a little. Pam wondered whether she was debating how much of her human life to reveal, or simply trying to recall the details. Most of Pam's pre-vampire days were fuzzy now. She couldn't even remember being a child, save for a few memories that seemed to centre on boiled eggs and a rocking horse and some women with white aprons.

"Before I was Karin the Slaughterer," Karin continued, in the end. "I was simply the pig girl. I had no family and I looked after the pigs of a man who had many. He had a son who said he would marry me, so, I had sex with him. He married a girl from another town who had pigs of her own." Karin's tone didn't give away what she thought about that development in her life.

"I thought that he could have her, but he could not have his pigs too. So, in the night, I went to the sty. And I killed them all."

"And someone was watching you do this," Pam added.

"Yes. But he did not come for me that night. It was too dangerous. Eric did not come for…two months, perhaps? Or three. It seemed a long time. By that time everyone knew that I was Karin the Slaughterer and with no pigs to watch I had no way to keep myself. I had already lain with several men who would give me money or food. I do not understand, though, why they would do that, when in the day they would shun me, or spit on me? I was still the same person at night." Karin looked genuinely perplexed at that, as though she had spent several hundred years pondering the behaviour of men and was still no closer to an answer.

Pam thought that if Karin hadn't figured it out by now, she was never going to, and didn't bother trying to give an explanation.

Karin didn't seem perturbed by Pam's lack of response, however, and she continued her story. "But Eric wanted me to come with him, and he gave me a new life. And it was wonderful, as you well know, sister." Pam nodded. "He saw in me what I could be, and he made me what I am." Karin smiled broadly, and her eyes were shining.

"You sought revenge on those who had harmed you, and in your new life you brought Eric's vengeance to those who had earned it." Pam could understand Eric's reasoning for picking the lonely girl who was willing to kill a sty full of pigs.

"And in return I was no longer alone. I was proud that he chose me, for there were many who would have taken my place at his side." Pam wondered if that was, in fact, the case, but didn't correct Karin. "Whatever price he asked of me, it was not too high. Not for what I gained."

"No," Pam said. "It was not too high." She knew that the life, or life after death, she had led would never have been possible without Eric. Though her gratitude might have its roots in the blood he gave her, she did not think it any the less genuine.

"May I ask?" Karin inquired. "What father saw in you?"

Pam thought about that, which was something she rarely did. Mostly because she knew the answer, or suspected she knew, but didn't feel there was anything to be gained from long contemplation of the matter.

"I suppose, as he caught me sneaking out to meet a boy, that he sensed in me boldness, and a…desire for adventure. One that we shared. And, of course, he may have been lonely." Pam hoped that would satisfy Karin, and kept to herself the suspicion that Eric's choice also factored in Pam's willingness to lie to those around her to suit her own ends.

But then, would that be such a bad thing? They were creatures of the shadows after all; dissembling was their stock in trade. If that was why he had chosen her, then he had chosen well.

All the same, Pam found that as the years passed she had an uneasy feeling about the circumstances of her turning. And it wasn't just Sookie's insistence that Eric had murdered her which caused it.

Karin, however, found other points of interest in her story. "You had a boy? You were very lucky, sister." Karin's face momentarily looked like that of the teenage girl she must have been on the night Eric made her, as she looked wistfully at Pam.

"Perhaps. But I do not believe my human life was any great loss."

"Of course it was not," Karin scoffed. "Eric gave us eternity." She was silent for a moment. "Do you think that if he meets the true death, she will mourn with us? Sookie?"

"I'm sure she will," Pam said, and she felt it to be true. Even without the blood, Sookie would surely feel his loss as keenly as Karin and herself. Perhaps more so, for her ties to Eric ran deeper than just blood. At least, Pam believed they did.

Or she wanted to believe it. In case it became a necessary truth.

"I am glad for that," Karin replied. "Glad that he had someone who loved him as, perhaps, we do not. He is not bad, and he deserved that."

Pam nodded. She had been glad when Sookie had entered Eric's life, all of their lives, although, at times, she had worried for the distraction Sookie caused her maker. Their parting had been bitter and not without some fault on both sides.

But Pam was not in the business of regrets so she would not wish it had been otherwise now. She still counted Sookie as a friend, her only human friend, and she was more than glad of that.

"I just wish that Eric had turned her," Karin said. "And she could have stood with us, as our sister. But she did not want that." Karin's brow furrowed, as she no doubt struggled to understand Sookie's choices.

Pam, who was, after all, much younger than Karin, thought that perhaps she had a clearer picture. Sookie was not a sad and aggressive girl, shunned by her society. She was not a hot-house lily, bound tightly in a corset and planted firmly in a house she would never escape. Eric could not choose her, free her or give her anything other than she could give herself in this wonderful modern age. He could not offer her freedom, or safety, at least not as humans understood those things. As a vampire, you might have the skills to fight your own battles, but that was expected of you, and you would fight for others too.

Eric's days of snatching girls in the night were gone, and Sookie was, in some ways, the benefactor of that.

Although Pam did agree that she would have made a wonderful vampire.

In the end all Eric could offer her was his love, and that was not enough. Or, perhaps, it was true that he had no real love to give, and Sookie saw that. Either way, their story was over.

For now.

"Sookie has the real sun," Pam said. "And she does not, therefore, need to orbit our maker in quite the same way we do."

Karin looked nonplussed. "She is all the poorer for it."

"Perhaps. But I do not think that is an opinion you should share with her."

And then Karin said the thing that hung in the air through most of this conversation. "Perhaps you could turn her?"

"I do not think that would be wise with the way the current climate prevails," Pam replied. It was not an unequivocal answer, but then, very little she said was unequivocal.

But Karin seemed unusually perceptive tonight. "You think that Sookie is more than what we see in her? And you fear what we may make her?"

Pam closed her eyes, briefly. "I will do my duty to ensure her safety, if and when the time is right. Until then, Sookie remains what she is. A friend to us and our maker." Though Pam's tone was not threatening, she hoped that her meaning was clear. She doubted Karin would act on her own, but then you could never entirely tell what any vampire was thinking.

Even Sookie knew that.

"But," Pam continued. "Sookie will stand with us if the time for mourning comes and, make no mistake, we will honour our maker by continuing his line. He wishes that his blood not end with us, and it will be so. We will pick children who will be worthy of our maker's blood."

"If that is his wish, then it is so," Karin said, solemnly.

A silence fell between the two vampires. "Do you have shelter for the day?" Pam inquired, after a while.

"I do. But I thank you for your concern." Karin stood up. "And now I must take my leave. Sister Pam, it has been good to visit with you."

"And I have also enjoyed your company," Pam returned, feeling mildly surprised that her words felt true. "I shall look forward to your next visit."

Karin nodded, once, and then, in a swift and fluid motion she stood up and exited the room. Pam was alone again and she was about to resume her work when her phone beeped, signalling a text message.

She did not recognise the number, and the message was brief: _Our roses will bloom in Texas._

Pam turned away from the phone. She was glad that Eric had not met his death yet, but still…

She hoped he was confident in the path he chose to tread. And that his meaning was not as she feared it might be.

But she was prepared if it was.

Pam typed back: _Weather will not be suitable for planting for several seasons._

Then she placed the phone back on her desk and picked up the roster again.

**Thanks for reading!**


	4. Damn your love, damn your lies

**A/N So here it is, the fourth and final chapter that I didn't think was actually going to be part of the story. Thank you all for coming along for the ride!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own these characters.**

_Damn your love, damn your lies._

The last month had passed slowly. Each morning the sun rose and I got up and checked for signs that something had changed, that all wasn't as I hoped. But so far all remained the same.

Each evening I watched the sun set and knew I could check another day off. I was counting down until things were settled and we could let other people know that I was pregnant.

Sam was a little less convinced of the need to keep it a secret. I think if I'd let him have his way he would have had a sign up in the bar so that all the customers who came in could know what we'd achieved.

But I wasn't so convinced of our good fortune. I'd watched Jason's wife, Michele, go through two miscarriages, and the memory of Crystal experiencing the same wasn't that far back, either. There was nothing to say that whatever had stopped Sam and I conceiving for so long wouldn't rear its ugly head and put an end to this pregnancy as well. Nothing in this life was guaranteed, after all.

So we were keeping it quiet and I was doing my best not to be too obvious when I had to head out the back of the bar to the bathroom and retch over a toilet, or just sit in the office until the nausea died down.

Feeling so sick was a good sign, though. At least that was what Michele had said. She'd told me that she realised that she'd lost her second pregnancy when the morning sickness stopped, but she hadn't wanted to admit it to herself at the time.

I was determined to be prepared for the worst, however, even if it might not come to that. I felt like I had been preparing for a lot of things, lately, but none of them had yet come to fruition. Eric's out of the blue visit seemed to have been a one off and I'd heard nothing since. Even Pam had been unusually quiet, although it was the busy season for Fangtasia. Vampire bars were more popular when the nights were longer.

Merlotte's was busy too but Sam and I had managed one of those rare nights when both of us were at home. Although I knew that he still had difficulty handing over the running of the bar to Danny and Kennedy, he had made the effort and he was home for me. I'd made us meatloaf for dinner, although the mashed potatoes hadn't tasted as good as they normally did.

My taste buds were off, though, and nothing tasted that good anymore. And my sense of smell was off the charts. My nose hadn't been this sensitive since I'd had the drugs that had allowed me to act as the shaman for Alcide's Were pack. That seemed like another lifetime ago.

These days my concerns were far more mundane, but consumed me more thoroughly. And I was all the happier for having the time to concentrate on me, and my family.

As I was clearing the dishes the phone had rung, and Sam answered it. It was his mom, who somehow always had a sixth sense about the nights Sam was at home and we would get a little time to ourselves.

I sighed, as I scraped the leftover potatoes from my plate. I didn't want to be uncharitable, but why did she have to pick now?

I had known that Sam came with a family when I married him, of course. And his mom, Bernie, had done me a big favour when she'd taken my friend Barry in after he got into a little trouble with vampires, but I still would have sure appreciated if she'd had better timing.

Sam stepped around into the hall, with the phone still in his hand. I figured he was probably trying to concentrate on his mom's news, and not be distracted by the clatter of the dishes as I piled them in the sink.

I set to my task, holding my breath as I emptied all the scraps into the trash can. That thing smelt awful to my nose, and I thought that I might ask Sam to empty it when he was done with his conversation.

I rinsed, and then washed the dishes. I dried them, and put them away, and then I wrapped up the leftover meatloaf and put it in the refrigerator. Sam would be working late the next night and would probably be glad of some supper when he arrived home.

I sat down at the table and waited for Sam; I could hear his voice murmuring occasionally from his spot around the corner. Tiredness hit me suddenly, like someone placed a large, warm blanket over my head. It was all I could do to keep my eyes open, and I didn't think I was doing very well at it.

"Hey, is it that boring without my company?" Sam's voice said suddenly.

"What? Oh." I must have dozed off a little with my chin in my hands. My mind hadn't completely shut down, though, and I had been thinking about whether my black work pants were going to fit me for much longer.

"How's your mom?" I asked.

"Oh, the same as usual." Sam sat down opposite me.

"She still seeing that guy Tad?"

"Yup." Sam pulled a face. "And she's still making that joke."

"She hasn't grown tired of it then?" Bernie had a new boyfriend, one who wasn't much older than Sam was, and who was a were-cougar. She liked to tell us that she was happy not to be the cougar in the relationship. Sam wasn't so happy to be reminded of that fact.

"Nope. Nor of Tad himself, seems like. They just had a weekend in Corpus Christi and she said it was the nicest trip she'd had in a long time."

I tried not to take that personally as, I was almost certain, Bernie's previous trip had been to see Sam and me. She was fine, in small doses, but I had found having her here, in the house that had always been mine and was now ours, a little bit stressful.

Sam had tried to keep the peace between us, and nearly run himself ragged in the process. I felt for him, and wished I could do the same for him, but my family was thin on the ground and in-laws hard to come by.

Sam went quiet for a moment, and I could tell, probably even without the fact I was getting a worried signal from his brain, that he had some other news. "What?" I asked.

"She was asking about Christmas."

"Oh." I sighed, which was a bad move as Sam looked a little offended. He might have been easy-going, and he might have mostly been on my side, but Bernie was still his mother.

I made a mental note to hold myself in check a little more. "She did point out that we missed Thanksgiving," Sam said, slowly.

"I know. But we had to work."

"Yeah. So did Deirdra, though, and she and Craig still made it."

"Well, they live closer." I was running out of excuses. "OK. We'll do Christmas with your family." I wasn't up to fighting over something that wasn't really important.

"And maybe by then we'll have news?" Sam asked, not even bothering to hide the excitement he was feeling.

"Maybe," I agreed. I did a small internal check and thought that, perhaps, I could sense another mind floating around somewhere inside of me. Or perhaps that's what I wanted to believe. I gave up.

"I think we'll be OK," Sam said, and he reached over and patted my hand. Neither of us went into what would happen if the pregnancy didn't work out. Having a baby required optimism, whatever way you looked at it, and we were going to be optimistic. Even if it killed us.

"You, didn't…uh…say anything, did you?" I asked, cautiously. "About…me…?" Although I wouldn't have really been the subject of the discussion.

Sam frowned. "No! Of course I wouldn't, Sookie. I know you want to keep it just between us for now, and if I tell Mom then the whole family'll know in no time. No, we'll tell her when you say it's the right time." Sam nodded to himself and looked like he was going to remain pretty steadfast on the matter.

"So, did she have any other news?" I asked Sam, wanting to change the subject.

"Oh, well Mindy and Doke bought a mini-van and she drove it over to show Mom. Mom thinks it's a silly looking thing and it'll just guzzle gas, but, as I said, with that many kids there aren't a lot of choices and if Mindy's happy with it, let it be."

"Anything else?" I asked. The gossip from Wright was working as a distraction from everything else I could be worrying about.

"Mom thinks that Craig and Deirdra are starting to take her for granted and she's cutting off their babysitting a little. She says she doesn't mind watching Gracie when Deirdra's got a shift, but that she and Dad never had a 'date night' in their lives and their marriage was great. She thinks they've got some odd ideas about what's important, and that family time should be top of the list."

"Did the full moon not count as a date night then?" I asked. I was still curious about what life was like for shifters and the longer I'd spent with Sam the more confident I'd become about asking.

Sam burst out laughing at that. "I hadn't thought of that!" he said. "I'll have to tell Craig to use it as an argument when Mom complains to him, although more likely she'll keep on watching Gracie and just complain to Mindy instead."

"I guess that's families for you," I said, even though it wasn't really my experience of one. I had no one to complain to but Jason, and he wasn't exactly cut out to listen to my concerns. He was happy I'd settled, there was no doubting that, and he'd of course be pleased to be an uncle so soon after becoming a dad, but I didn't think he wanted to listen to all the ins and outs of my life.

"Yep. Sure is. Oh, and Mom said that Barry passed through."

"He did? How is he?" I was actually excited to hear that Barry was still safe and well. He was the only other telepath I'd ever met, apart from my little cousin Hunter, and we had bonded through that and a bunch of shared experiences, including a near-death one here at my house. Since he'd stayed with Bernie he'd travelled around a lot, trying to figure out what he wanted out of life, and I hadn't seen him in a while.

"Oh…she didn't really say much…" Sam said, which probably meant he didn't ask. I rolled my eyes. Men, they didn't know how to ask for the good gossip, did they?

"He only stayed a little while," Sam continued. "Mom said he got a bit spooked because there were a lot of vamps around."

"There were?" Barry had run afoul of the Texas vamps when he'd been working for their king. Ever since then he hadn't felt that safe in the presence of the undead.

"Yeah. But not ones he knew, apparently." Sam shrugged. "Guess they all move around a lot."

"I guess so." I didn't want to think too much about vampire migration or anything else to do with them. Not tonight, when I had Sam to myself. "Any other news?"

"Not much." I thought that might be the end of the conversation. "Oh, only other thing was that Mom said the Fellowship of the Sun chapel has finally got new tenants in there. Mostly she's just happy because they cleaned up all the graffiti that had sprung up on the side of the building since the FoTS left. She said it was just a reminder of all the crap they'd put the town through."

The Fellowship of the Sun church had decided to use Craig and Deirdra's wedding as a staging ground for one of their anit-supe protests. Sam and I had been involved in trying to keep the wedding on track and I'd had a few unpleasant run-ins with the members of the church while I was there. It had cemented in Bernie's mind that I was someone her son could trust, but it had also marked me as someone you didn't want to cross.

I wasn't sure whether that's the first impression you should give your future mother in law, but I couldn't re-do it now. There was a lot from that time of my life that I just had to live with. I'd made my choices, and regrets just did nobody any good.

"Did she say who'd taken the building over?" I asked.

"Some other church. Not one she knows, but they don't seem to be preaching hate, so she's not bothered. Now, what did she say they were?"

My eyes were starting to droop again and I contemplated the fact that I might have to waste my evening off by going to bed early. "Oh yeah," Sam said. "The Church of the Loving Spirit, that was it. They sound a little better than the previous tenants, anyhow."

A cold wave of nausea washed over me and bile rushed up to my throat. "You all right, Sookie?" Sam asked, concern flooding his face and voice.

"Oh. Yeah. Just morning sickness, I guess."

Sam looked pleased, and then immediately tried to push that expression away and go back to concern. "Seems the wrong time of day for it," he said. "I guess the name's a little misleading, huh?" I nodded. "Can I get you anything?" he continued. "Crackers or ginger ale, or something?"

"No. I don't think I could face anything right now."

Another wave hit me, and I stood up quickly and ran down the hall to the bathroom, where I knelt in front of the toilet and vomited up all my dinner.

Sam was right. Morning sickness was the wrong name for it completely.

**Thanks for reading!**


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